Sharpe's Eagle (28 page)

He turned round and stared at the far horizon and the red glow of the French fires that lined
the edge of the hill with a faint light. There were rabbits moving on the crest of the hill he
had climbed, he could see their small shapes bobbing, and suddenly he froze. Had there been
sentries there he had missed? They were not rabbits. He could see the silhouettes of men, he had
mistaken their heads for rabbits, but as they climbed over the crest he could see a dozen men,
carrying guns, heading towards him. He lay flat on the grass, gripping the sword, and stared at
the dim glow of the skyline. He put his ear to the ground and heard what he had feared to hear,
the faint thump of marching feet, and he raised his head and kept looking as the dozen men turned
into a misshapen mass. He remem-bered telling Hogan that the French would not attack at night,
yet he suspected he was seeing just that; a night attack on the Medellin. The dozen men would be
some of the skirmishers, the French Voltigeurs, and the solid mass was a French column climbing
the hill in the silence of night. But how to be sure? It could as easily be a British Battalion
moving in the dark, finding a new place to camp, but this late at night? He wriggled forward on
knees and elbows, keeping his body close to the earth so that whoever was coming in the dark
would not see him silhouetted in the fires. The sword rustled on the grass, he seemed to be
making a deafening sound, but the men walked on towards him. He stopped when they stopped, and he
watched them kneel. He was almost sure they were Voltigeurs, the skirmish line that had been sent
ahead to flush out the sentries, and now that they were in sight of their targets they were
waiting for the column so that the attack should crash home in unison. Sharpe held his breath.
The kneeling men were calling softly to each other and he wanted to hear the language.

French. He turned his head and stared at the fires marking the British line. No-one moved
there, the men were sitting staring at the flames, waiting for the morning and completely unaware
that their enemy had found the plateau of the Medellin undefended and were about to attack.
Sharpe had to warn the British, but how? A single rifle shot would be put down to a nervous
sentry seeing shadows in the night; he could not shout that far, and if he turned and ran, then
he would not reach the British fires much before the French. There was only one way. That was to
provoke the French into firing a volley, a rattle of musketry that would startle the British,
warn them of danger and make them form a crude line. He gripped the sword, noted the nearest
shadow of a kneeling Voltigeur, then scrambled to his feet and sprinted towards the enemy. The
man looked up as Sharpe neared him and put a finger to his lips. Sharpe screamed, a curdling yell
of anger and challenge, and chopped sideways with the sword. He did not wait to see if he had
caused any damage but ran on, wrenching the blade free, screaming at the next man. This one stood
up, shouted a question, and died with the blade in his belly. Sharpe went on shouting. He tugged
the sword free, whirled it in the air so that it sang, spotted movement to his left and ran at
yet another Voltigeur. The suddenness of his attack had startled them; they had no idea how many
men were among them, or where they came from. Sharpe saw two skirmishers together, their bayonets
levelled at him, but he screamed, they faltered, and he cut at one man as he swerved past and
disappeared in the night.

He dropped flat in the grass. No-one had fired. He heard the French running through the grass,
the moans of a wounded man, but no-one had fired at him. He lay still, stared at the skyline, and
waited until his eyes could see the dim shapes of the approaching column. Questions were shouted
forward, he could hear the Voltigeurs hissing back their answers, but still they were undetected;
the British sat at their fires and waited for a dawn that might never happen. Sharpe had to
provoke that volley.

He laid the sword flat on the grass and pulled the Baker off his shoulder. He slid it forward,
opened the pan and felt that the powder was still in place, then eased the flint back until he
felt it click into place. The French were quiet again; their attacker had disappeared as quickly
as he had come.

"Talion! Talion will fire by companies! Present!"

He shouted meaningless orders at the French. He could see the shape of the column just fifty
yards away. The skirmishers had pulled back to join in the final march when this mass of men
would crash into the unsuspecting British.

"Talion!" He drew the word out. "Fire!"

The Baker spat its bullet towards the French and he heard a sharp cry. They would have seen
the muzzle flash but Sharpe rolled to his right and snatched up the sword.

"Tirez!" He shouted the order at the column. A dozen nervous soldiers pulled their triggers
and he heard the bullets whirring over the grass. At last! The British must have woken up and he
turned round to see men standing by the fires, signs of movement, even panic.

"Tirez! Tirez! Tirez!" He screamed at the column and more muskets banged in the night.
Officers shouted at their men to stop firing, but the damage was done. The British had heard the
firing, seen the musket flashes, and Sharpe could see men grabbing weapons, fixing bayonets,
waiting for whatever crouched in the dark. It was time to be going. The French were moving again,
and Sharpe sprinted towards the British lines. His running body was silhouetted against the fires
arid he heard a crackle of musketry and felt the bullets go past him. He shouted as he
ran.

"The French! Form line! The French!"

He saw Harper and the Riflemen running down the line, away from the centre where the French
would strike home, and out to the dimly lit edge of the plateau. That was sensible. Rifles were
not for close work, and the Sergeant was hiding his men in the shadows where they could snipe at
the enemy. Sharpe's breath echoed in his ears, he was panting, the run had become a struggle
against tiredness and the weight of his pack. He watched the South Essex form small nervous
groups that kept splitting up and reforming. No-one knew what was happening. To their right
another Battalion was in equal disarray, and behind Sharpe could hear the steady sound of the
French advan-cing at a trot.

"The French!" He had no more breath. Harper had disappeared. Sharpe hurdled a fire and ran
full tilt into a Sergeant who held on to him and supported him as he gasped for breath.

"What's happening, sir?"

"French column. Coming this way."

The Sergeant was bewildered. "Why didn't the first line stop them?"

Sharpe looked at him, astonished. "You are the first line!"

"No-one told us!"

Sharpe looked round him. Men ran to and fro looking for their Sergeants or officers, a mounted
officer rode forward through the fires. Sharpe could not see who it was, and disappeared towards
the column. Sharpe heard a shout, the scream of the horse as muskets fired, and the thump of the
beast falling. The musket flashes showed where the French were, and Sharpe, with a pang of
satisfaction, heard the crisp sound of the Bakers at the hill's edge.

Then the column was visible, their white trousers showing in the firelight, angling across
their front and aiming at the centre of the British line. Sharpe screamed the orders. "Present.
Fire!" A few muskets banged, the white smoke swallowed immediately in the darkness, and Sharpe
was alone. The men had fled at the sight of the massive column. Sharpe ran after them, beating at
men with his sword. "You're safe here! Stand still!" But it was no good. The South Essex, like
the Battalion next to them, had broken and panicked and were streaming back to-wards the fires in
their rear, where Sharpe could see men forming in companies, the ranks tipped with
bayonets.

It was chaos. Sharpe cut across the fugitives, making for the edge of the hill and the
darkness where his Riflemen lay hidden. He found Knowles, with a group of the company, and pushed
them ahead to join Harper, but most of the Battalion was running back. The French fired their
first volley, a massive rolling thunder of shots that cracked the night with smoke and flame, and
cut a swathe in the troops ahead of them. The Battalion ran blindly back towards the safety of
the next line of fires, Sharpe crashed into fugitives, shook them off, struggled towards the
comparative peace of the edge of the hill. A voice shouted, "What's happening?" Sharpe turned.
Berry was there, his jacket undone, his sword drawn, his black hair falling over his fleshy face.
Sharpe stopped, crouched, and growled. He remembered the girl, her terror, her pain, and he rose
to his feet, walked the few paces, and grabbed Berry's collar. Frightened eyes turned on
him.

"What's happening?"

He pulled the Lieutenant with him, over the crest, down into the darkness of the slope. He
could hear Berry babbling, asking what was happening, but he pulled him down until they were both
well below the crest and hidden from the fires. Sharpe heard the last fugitives pound past on the
summit, the crackle of musketry, the shouts diminishing as the men ran back. He let go of Berry's
collar. He saw the white face turn to him in the darkness, there was a gasp.

"My God. Captain Sharpe? Is that you?"

"Weren't you expecting me?" Sharpe's voice was as cold as a blade in winter. "I was looking
for you."

A spent musket ball whirred over Sharpe's head; the sounds of the battle were fainter now that
he was below the crest and the only light came from the eerie reflections of the deserted fires
on the undersides of the battle-smoke that drifted from the plateau of the Medellin.

"Sharpe!" Berry was still babbling. He lay on his back and tried to wriggle his way uphill
away from the tall, dark shape of the Rifleman. "Shouldn't we go, Sharpe, the French? They're on
the hill!"

"I know. I've killed at least two of them." Sharpe held his blade at Berry's breast and
stopped the wriggling. "I'm going back to kill a few more soon."

The talk of killing silenced Berry. Sharpe could see the face staring up at him but it was too
dark to read the expression. Sharpe had to imagine the wet lips, the fleshy face, the look of
fear.

"What did you do to the girl, Berry?"

The Lieutenant remained silent. Sharpe could see the slim sword lying forgotten on the grass;
there was no fight in the man, no will to resist, just a pathetic hope that Sharpe could be
placated.

"What did you do, Berry?" Sharpe stepped closer and the blade flickered at Berry's throat.
Sharpe saw the face twist to and fro, heard the breath gulping in the Lieutenant's
throat.

"Nothing, Sharpe, I swear it. Nothing."

Sharpe flicked his wrist so that the blade nicked Berry's chin. It was razor sharp and he
heard the gasp.

"Let me go. Please! Let me go."

"What did you do?" Sharpe heard the distinctive sound of the rifles firing to his right. The
rolling crackle of musketry was to the left, and he guessed that the French column had thrown its
skirmishers out to the flanks to clear away the scattered groups that still offered resistance.
He had not much time; he wanted to be with his men and to see what was happening on the hilltop,
but first he wanted Berry to suffer as the girl had suffered, to fear as she had
feared.

"Did Josefina plead with you?" The voice was like a night wind off the North Sea. "Did she ask
you to let her go?"

Berry stayed silent. Sharpe twitched the blade again. "Did she?"

"Yes." It was a mere whisper.

"Was she frightened?" He moved the point onto the flesh of Berry's neck.

"Yes, yes, yes."

"But you raped her just the same?"

Berry was too terrified to speak. He made incoherent noises, rolled his head, stared at the
blade which ran up to the dim, avenging shape above him. Sharpe could smell the pungent smoke of
the musketry on the hill. He had to be quick.

"Can you hear me, Berry?"

"Yes, Sharpe. I can hear you." There was the faintest hint of hope in Berry's voice. Sharpe
dashed it.

"I'm going to kill you. I want you to know that so you are as frightened as she was. Do you
understand?"

The man babbled again, pleaded, shook his head, dropped his arms and held his hands together
as if in prayer to Sharpe. The Rifleman stared down. He remem-bered a strange phrase he had once
heard at a Church Parade in far-off India. A Chaplain had appeared and stood in his white
surplice on the parade ground and out of the meaningless mumbles a phrase had somehow lodged in
Sharpe's mind, a phrase from the prayer book that came back to him now as he wondered whether he
really could kill a man for raping his woman. "Deliver my soul from the sword, my darling from
the power of the dog." Sharpe had thought to let the man stand up, pick up his sword, and fight
for his life. But he thought of the girl's terror, let the picture of her blood on the sheets
feed his anger once more, saw the babbling fleshy face beneath him and as if he were tired and
simply wanted to rest, he leaned forward with both hands on the hilt of the sword.

The babbling almost became a scream, the body thrash-ed once, the blade went through skin and
muscle and fat and into Berry's throat, and the Lieutenant died. Sharpe stayed bent on the sword.
It was murder, he knew that, a capital offence but somehow he did not feel guilty. What troubled
him was the knowledge that he ought to be guilty yet he was not. He had avenged his darling on
the dog. His hands were wet and he knew, as he tugged the blade free, that he had severed Berry's
jugular. He would look like someone from a slaughterhouse but he felt better and grinned in the
darkness as he dropped to one knee and ran his hands swiftly across Berry's pockets and pouches.
Revenge, he decided, felt good and he pulled coins from the dead man's tunic and thrust them into
his own pockets. He walked away from the body towards the sound of the rifles, walked slowly
uphill to where the flashes spat bullets towards the French, and sank down beside Harper. The
Sergeant looked at him and then turned back to face the hilltop and pulled his trigger. Smoke
puffed from the pan, belched from the barrel, and Sharpe saw a Voltigeur fall backwards into a
fire. Harper grinned with satisfaction.